Patriots shifting toward regular-season mode

Players say there's been more of a regular-season feel to it all with tonight's third game of the preseason here.

Glen Farley The Enterprise @GFarley_ent

FOXBORO – OK, so it’s not the real deal.

The third game on an NFL team’s four-game preseason slate is a reasonable facsimile, however.

This is the league’s version of a dress rehearsal.

“This week there’s more emphasis on more of a game week (like) during the regular season,” veteran cornerback Darrelle Revis said on Tuesday, “so guys are just getting into that mode and I think as a whole we’re getting into that mode of a regular-season game.”

Contributing to the regular season-readiness theme, after back-to-back weeks of joint practices with the Washington Redskins and the Philadelphia Eagles, the Patriots and the Carolina Panthers were left to their own devices in preparing for tonight’s game at Gillette Stadium (7:30; Channels 4 and 12; WBZ-FM/98.5).

Again, that’s in keeping with the regular-season mode.

“I think this has been a good week of preparation for us,” quarterback Tom Brady said Wednesday. “In the last two weeks, we’ve actually had an opportunity to practice against both those teams, which you’re kind of learning on the fly.

“We didn’t really do a lot of things leading up to those weeks because we figure three days of practice will get us familiar enough, but this week’s been much more like a normal week and we’ve had scouting report meetings and talked about coverages and blitzes and third down and two minute, all the different situations that come up.”

There has, indeed, been a change in approach.

“More emphasis on game planning-type scenarios in all three phases – offense, defense and special teams,” said Revis. “Just going through those and preparing like this is (a) Week One, Week Two regular-season game, so we’re going over all those scenarios.”

The most significant development tonight will be the amount of playing time allotted the starters, that time generally increasing dramatically in the third preseason game.

In other words, plan on seeing Brady a lot more than you have to this point in the preseason when he’s been on the field for just two series and thrown all of 10 passes (completing eight).

“The starters play more than they have in the past two games,” running back Shane Vereen said, “but at the same time you’ve got to look at each opportunity, each rep, as a chance to get better and prepare yourself for Sept. 7 (the date of the Patriots’ regular-season opener at Miami).”

As for the Panthers, with his team in the midst of a short week (with some of their starters playing into the second half, they defeated the Kansas City Chiefs, 28-16, on Sunday night), head coach Ron Rivera told reporters in Carolina on Wednesday he would “love to be able to ... get 30-35 snaps (for his regulars) on both sides of the ball.”

While tonight will mark the most extended game time of the summer for many of the Patriots’ big names, it will also represent last call for some of the no-names as the league’s initial cutdown of the summer (to 75; the Pats’ roster currently numbers 87) looms Tuesday at 4 p.m.

Final cuts to the regular-season limit of 53 must be made by Aug. 30 at 6 p.m., two days after the Patriots’ preseason finale with the New York Giants at MetLife Stadium.

While individuals attempt to make the cut, the team, as a whole, also strives to make the grade in the preseason game that most closely resembles what lies ahead when it really counts.

“This is a good game to gauge where we’re at,” said Brady, “because we’re playing a really good team.”

Glen Farley may be reached at gfarley@enterprisenews.com. Follow him on Twitter at @GFarley_ent.